Applications on mobile devices, such as the iPhone® or the iPad®, have fast become a growing trend in the smartphone and tablet markets. The development of mobile applications has drastically increased in recent years as more and more users of mobile devices gravitate towards the user-friendly functionality of a mobile application over the Internet browser. As a result, businesses having increasingly developed their own mobile applications to provide products and services, as well as advertising, financial services, education, technical information, and other forms of customer service.
Insurance companies are among those businesses developing mobile applications. Such mobile applications are available to primary policyholders for the company's insurance products and services. For example, GEICO® offers a mobile application, which allows primary policyholders access to certain features or services relating to their insurance policy. The features may include the ability to pay a bill, find discounts, view details about coverage, view driver and vehicle information, or update contact information. Other companies also offer mobile applications to their accountholders providing features such as banking or financial services, entertainment, shopping, education, etc. These mobile applications may also enable accountholders to pay a bill, find discounts, view details about their account, access account information, or update contact information. For example, a mobile application of a banking entity may allow an accountholder of the bank to view his bill, make payments, transfer money, or download statements. A mobile application of an entertainment service, such as Netflix®, may allow an accountholder to view movies on the mobile device.
Often times, however, an account, such as an insurance policy, covers multiple individuals. For example, a multiple-driver insurance policy may cover a family of drivers, and may include two parents and one or more children. In this case, one individual serves as the primary accountholder (or “policyholder”) while the other drivers are secondary policyholders. In other situations, an account may cover a single individual, who shares certain features of the account with other individuals. For example, a checking account at a banking institution may cover a parent, and the parent may share a debit card with a child or spouse as an authorized user.
The primary accountholder may have access to the mobile application of the business, such as their insurance provider. In doing so, the primary accountholder normally logs into the mobile application using some form of login credentials. These credentials could include a password associated with a username, an email address, an account ID, or an account number. The secondary accountholders may also want access to the mobile application as well. However, the primary accountholder may not want to share his login credentials with the other accountholders for accessing and using the mobile application. For example, in the insurance context, a parent driver may not want to share his login credentials with his young, teenage drivers or with a spouse driver. Additionally, the primary accountholder may want to prevent any secondary accountholders from making changes to the account via the mobile application. As a result, the primary accountholder may want to limit access to certain features of the mobile application. For example, in the insurance context, the primary policyholder may want to be the only policyholder with the ability to modify the policy, make payments, and submit claims on a mobile application. However, the primary policyholder may want the secondary policyholders to have access to assistance features (e.g., roadside assistance) and education features on a mobile application.
Thus, there exists a need to provide a mobile application that allows secondary accountholders to have efficient and user friendly access to primary accountholder information while maintaining control of the accountholder information.